


fly again

by icarusinflight



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Cassandra Cain is Batgirl, F/F, Mild Language, Stephanie Brown is Spoiler
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-06
Updated: 2017-09-06
Packaged: 2018-12-23 05:45:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11983410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icarusinflight/pseuds/icarusinflight
Summary: Steph thanks her upbringing for not being too obvious about being intimidated by Batgirl the first time they meet.Despite that, she was still a little terrified.A series of moments where Batgirl and Spoiler spend time together





	fly again

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ratherrumpus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ratherrumpus/gifts).



> This was written for the 2017 Batfam Reverse Big Bang.  
> I've never written this pairing before, but I read Steph's run as Batgirl so most of my characterisations of both of them came from that. I apologise for any errors. ~~but I probably blame DCU for their continuity issues if there are though~~
> 
> Thank you so much to ratherrumpus/unwiselybats(on tumblr) for being my partner in this and to the mods for organising.
> 
> edit: I literally tried so hard to have the image in the doc guys but it just kept coming up as a broken image. I don't know :( Please follow the link, trust me it's amazing
> 
> Thanks also to everyone else who participated!

Written for this art piece by the wonderful [unwiselybats](unwiselybats.tumblr.com)

 

 

[art by Unwiselybats](https://imgur.com/KhM5Vjn)

 

Steph thanks her upbringing for not being too obvious about being intimidated by batgirl the first time they meet. When you have to deal with your abusive supervillain parent, showing weakness is never an option. So even if she was terrified (and she was), she tried not to show it.

When Steph was introduced to Batgirl, her first impression was that this Batgirl was very different to the last one. The first batgirl was a force of nature, and certainly a force to be reckoned with.

But this Batgirl was… something else. _Fierce_ was the word that came to mind.

The new Batgirl carried herself with a lethality which was glaringly obvious. That anyone could look at her, and still decide to take her on was a testament to their stupidity in Steph’s opinion.

Steph was under no illusions that she could take on Batgirl.

And she was very intimidated by her.

It didn’t help that her presence working with the bats was tenuous at best. As Spoiler, she was aware that the majority of the Bats did not approve of her. She was only tolerated because Tim has backed her, and because she wouldn’t stay away.

So she was a little worried about Batgirl.

Tim has introduced them, Batgirl and Spoiler, and even though her mask covered her face completely, there was no hiding the fact that Batgirl was evaluating her, sizing her up. Steph felt naked, laid bare under her scrutiny.

But then she must make a decision at least somewhat in Steph’s favour, because she extends a hand, offering hers to shake with Steph.

The offer had surprised Steph, and she’d grabbed the hand enthusiastically, stammering out “It’s umm, it’s a real pleasure to meet you. Batgirl has been, like, such an inspiration to me.”

Batgirl had carefully extricated her hand from Steph’s hands, and had walked away without any further words.

At the time Steph thought she had spectacularly fucked up their introduction, even if Tim has assured her otherwise.

It wasn’t until later that Cass had told her the truth, and finally allayed her fears on the issue.

Which is all beside the point, which is that Steph, if she hasn’t been desensitised by growing up around supervillians, would have been absolutely terrified of Cass.

Despite that, she was still a little terrified.

 

* * *

 

 

Steph was on stakeout, watching the bar where Cluemaster was drinking. The bar was a known super villain dive bar. Where super villains hung out to drink, but also where they could collude, or to find brutes stupid enough to assist in their plans.

Cluemaster’s fellow criminals knew he went there to drink. The batfam knew he went there to drink, Steph knew he went there to drink. The only person who didn't know was her mum. Or maybe she'd just reached the point where she didn't care.

When Arthur had left the house he’d been cagey, and told them not to wait up for them. And her mum had seemed ambivalent about that. On one hand if he was out that was good, in the other hand he might get into trouble while he was out, and they never could know what he'd be like when he returned.

He was Arthur now because if he was starting heists again he didn’t want to think of him as Dad.

And if he was on heists again, Spoiler was flying again.

Honestly, Steph had missed it. Leaping from rooftops, feelings like she had a purpose. Even the sitting and watching, which was her least favourite part.

Arthur was halfway through his fourth beer when Steph heard the small noise.

It was so small it could have been nothing, the wind maybe rustling something behind her, but Steph knew better than to think that. The light barely there thump on the rooftop behind her, was the unmistakable sound of the arrival of a robin.

Without turning around she called out “Hey Robin.”

“Spoiler.” Robin acknowledged somewhat grumpily, and Steph felt a small amount of satisfaction for putting that tone there.

Okay, maybe not a small amount.

Steph could be immature sometimes. So sue her. She needs to have her fun where she can get it.

When she hears the footsteps behind her she knows it’s only because Robin lets her. She may be able to hear the sound of a body landing on the rooftop, but Robin can make his footsteps silent if he wants to.

When he crouches beside her she isn't surprised.

It’s the second body that drops down next to her which causes her to jump.

“Jesus fuck!” She lets out, and makes and attempt to jump back from the unknown figure, catching her ankle on nothing, and falling onto her ass in the process.

Robin, the asshole that he is, laughs at her.

The other person shows no reaction, just watches Steph where she’s splayed on the roof.

“Fucking bats.” She mutters, picking herself up off the roof, she stands up, brushing dirt from her suit. She circles her ankle gingerly at first, testing the range, it does give a little of a click when it’s in the 3 o’clock position, but that’s an ongoing issue, she’s dealing with it. By which she means she ignores it and hopes it never gets worse.

As she does so both Robin and asshole bat observe her as she goes through her motions. it’s a slightly eerie feeling, but she’s been around bats long enough for it to not bother her. She takes the time to stretch her body out, she hadn’t moved in a while before the bats arrived, but she also wants to take as much time as possible to get her bearings and observe unknown-bat.

Stretching her shoulders, she observes unknown-bat out of the corner of her eye. The unforgiving batsuit doesn’t leave much to the imagination, so Steph can tell she’s female.

When she turns around to get a better look at the person, the first thing she sees is the giant yellow outline of a bat symbol on her chest.

Okay so not going for subtlety.

The rest of the suit is black though, and it covers her from head to toe. The Robin’s and Batman always have their mouth’s free, but this suit has stitching which covers up all of the face. Steph’s own suit covers the whole of her face, but this seems like a very deliberate covering. The stitches drawing extra attention to the covering.

Her attention is ripped away by Robin speaking “Spoiler this is Batgirl. She’s... new to the position.”

“Ummm, well, welcome to the job I guess?” Steph isn’t sure what the protocol is for this. She knows there have been previous Robin’s, and there was obviously the previous Batgirl, but she’s never been around for this.

Her mask may cover her face, but she’s obviously observing Steph, and Steph feels stripped down by her gaze.

It’s something about the way she holds herself Steph thinks, something that makes it obvious that this Batgirl is in a whole different league to Steph. Maybe to all of them, except probably Batman.

Robin was efficient. Scarily so. But this Batgirl... she was... something else.

Fuck Steph was so out of her league here.

“We’re just doing the rounds.” Robin’s voice dragged her from her thoughts once again. “Getting to know the places and people. Unless you need help with your thing?” Tim’s voice sounded a little hopeful at that, but is he wanted excitement he wasn’t going to find it here.

“Nah. I’m just on observation here. Probably nothing.”

Robin looked from her, down to the bar, and he either spotted Cluemaster, or put it together on his own.

“Oh.” He said. “Yeah, of course. Hope nothing happens, but if it does and you need backup?”

His voice trails off, the offer clear without words.

“Yeah, yeah,” she says, “I’ll buzz you. Have fun on your travels.

Steph gave a little wave of her hand, and Batgirl and Robin both gave nods, before walking off to the other edge of the rooftop.

Steph watched them go until she could no longer see their retreating forms.

Yeah she had a type.

 

* * *

 

Steph is reading her favourite book in the park. She’s comfortable underneath the shade of a tree, with one of her mum’s picnic blankets spread out underneath her. She’s completely absorbed in the book, when suddenly a body drops down onto the blanket next to her, startling her out of her world.

“Ummm, hi?“ Steph says the greeting as a question, she looks around like her surroundings will give her an answer, but they give her nothing. “Do I know you?“

The girl says nothing but does give her a smile.

She's beautiful, and her smile is beautiful. Steph is not above indulging a pretty girl on a pretty day like this.

The girl leans forward, and Steph tenses. She’s too used to contact meaning violence and pain, trained her instincts to react and be on high alert at any movement which could result in contact, but the girl just taps her book gently.

“Good book?“ She asks.

This might be going down as the most bizarre social interaction Steph has had. Certainly the most bizarre outside of the mask. Possibly ever. She's not sure. It’s definitely up there.

“Uh, yes, it's my favourite.“

This is a thing she does when Arthur is in a mood and her mum is on shift. She can't be at home, not alone with him. So she takes her copy of _the wish list_. And brings it out to the park. She'll stay here till her mum gets off at 9, then sneak in the window and pretend she was asleep. Arthur might not even notice she's gone. He might have already gone out looking for a job. She doesn't know. But she can't be in the house with him.

“Tell me?“

“Tell you?“ Steph echo's back confused. “Tell you what? About the book?“

“Please.“ The girl says, smiling at here again.

The stilted sentence feels familiar, like she's been here before, she doesn’t ignore the feeling, not exactly, but she does push it away to examine later. She’s learnt not to ignore these things.

It's a weird request. And she hesitates to acquiesce, before figuring what the hell. It's not often she gets to speak about her favourite book. And she does love it _oh so much_. She's not sure why the girl is asking her, but maybe she just wants somebody to talk to, somebody to talk to her.

Maybe she's running from something or someone too.

Steph can't deny her an escape, whatever her reason.

“Well, it's about a girl, and her parents are both dead, and then she's trying to rob an old man, to get away from her horrible step father, and when that's happening it goes wrong and she dies.“

“Sounds sad.“ The girl frowns.

“I mean, yeah, kinda.” This is one of the reasons why she doesn't talk about it, and it's hard to convince people to read it. It does have a sad premise, but she still loves it. “I know it's sad, but... It's also hopeful. She dies, and she goes to the afterlife. And then she gets stuck. Like she can't go to heaven or hell because she did some bad things and she did some good things and she's even. So she gets a chance to make up for what she's done. Fix it. Or maybe not fix it, fuck it all up. “

“She comes back to life?“

“No... She's a ghost, sort of. It's weird I guess. I don't… not many people like it. I guess I kind of like it because she gets a chance to fix it. Like yeah she fucked up, but it's not too late to fix it. I guess it's weird. Sorry. “

“No.“ The girl says, and she’s suddenly up in Steph's face again, Steph pulls back a little, trying to re-establish her personal space. The girl must notice, because she pulls back slightly too, and Steph feels immediately more comfortable with the space between them. “No, no sorry. Please don’t be sorry. Maybe... you could read it? To me?“

Which was really not the response she was expecting.

“Ummm,” she says, stalling, “You sure about that? You said it before, it's sad.“

“Yes, please.“

“Okay.“ Steph says, “Okay, but first, my name is Steph.” She extends her hand. She's not necessarily expecting her to introduce herself, or shake her hand, but she wants to offer. This whole interaction has been weird as it is, the least she can do is introduce herself.

So she is a little surprised when the girl takes the offered hand. Her hand is hard and callused, like she works, or maybe works out. She could be a gymnast. Even in the summer clothing she’s wearing Steph can see muscle definition. She’s a little jealous honestly, Steph can never achieve muscle definition like that, and she tries. The muscles are there, they’re just shyer than other peoples.

“Cass.” She says.

Which surprises her even more.

“Well. Hi Cass, it’s nice to meet you. I will be your storyteller for the day.” Cass gives a little laugh and Steph just freezes for a second watching her. Wow. This girl. Wow.

Thankfully her brain kicks back in before she can make it awkward. She picks up her book and turns to the first page.

“Okay, here we go.” Steph swallows, before putting on her best reading voice, “ _Meg and Belch were doing a job_.”

She reads to Cass for the rest of the day, taking breaks occasionally to drink and to rest her voice. When the sun starts to set and Steph starts to struggle to see the words she stops at the end of the chapter.

“So umm, this was... nice. Really nice. Thanks for sitting with me. But it's getting dark, and I can't keep reading in the dark.” She looks up to make eye contact with Cass, before asking softly, and hopefully with the sensitivity the question deserves, “Do you have somewhere you can go?”

Cass nods immediately. “Yes. Do you?”

She does. But… she won't be going there yet. It's still too soon for her to go home yet.

Cass is still waiting on a response, so Steph decides to lie. Kind of lie. It's not completely a lie.

“Yeah. I should probably get going. Go home and all that.”

She'll probably head to the library. It's open till 7. They have comfy bean bags on the 5th floor. They’re technically meant for kids 12 and under but the librarian seems to like her and lets her use them if there aren’t any kids around.

Cass studies her for a moment, Steph wants to back away, squirm, do anything to break her unrelenting gaze, but she also feels like that could be admitting a weakness of some sorts.

Steph **isn't** weak.

So she waits out the discomfort.

“Your… Home… could it wait? Are you hungry?”

She is hungry. But she was planning to ignore that for now.

“Why?“ Steph asks, cautiously.

“We could eat?” Cass asks, and before Steph starts to speak she continues quickly, “Not here, but somewhere, your choice? Maybe close? Quinns diner?“

Quinns is her favourite. She wonders if it means anything that Cass suggested Quinns. Could be nothing. Lots of people like Quinns, but she files it away just in case.

She’d love to go to Quinns. But she doesn't have enough money for it.

“I'm not –”

Cass cuts her off quickly, “I'll pay.”

Steph bristles at that. She doesn’t need Cass’s pity, or her charity.

 “I don't need you to do that. I don't need your charity.”

“Not charity. A payment. Or trade. For this.“ She points her hand at the book in Steph’s arms, and the to the ground. “A Thank you.”

Steph chews her lip, mulling the thought over. On one hand she is hungry, and she'd love to have dinner at Quinns. On the other hand she doesn't like to accept charity. Growing up she's learnt that these things rarely come free.

But Cass has said it's payment for reading. So maybe that's enough. Not that she considers reading to be work…

Fuck it.

“Okay.” She agrees, hoping she won’t regret it. “Let's go to Quinns.”

 

* * *

 

Steph orders a cheeseburger, loaded fries and a coke. Cass asks for the same thing, and then Steph orders a mac and cheese for them to share. They easily devour it all. Steph isn't surprised by finishing her own food, she knows she can put away food. But she is a little surprised, and maybe a tiny bit impressed that she can match Steph.

When they do finally leave, it's at a time that's reasonable for Steph to start heading home. They're standing somewhat awkwardly out the front of the diner. Steph isn't sure how to handle this now. She's a hugger with her friends. But she's only known Cass a day. She isn't sure what they are. Isn't sure if she'll ever see her again.

Cass solves the problem by stepping into her space and hugging her. Steph freezes a little initially at the unexpected contact, but tries to relax into it.

“Thank you.” Cass says softly as she pulls away, one hand still holding onto Steph. “See you soon” she says, with a wide grin. Then she’s walking off before Steph can respond, leaving a somewhat puzzled Steph standing in front of the Diner.

 

* * *

 

Oracle had asked Steph to come to go to the downtown district to break up a weapons deal.

It’s a bigger job than she’d normally take on herself, but it’s in collaboration with Batman. So she’s waiting on the rooftop of a warehouse, near the docks for her backup.

Although technically she’s the backup. But she doesn’t want to think about it like that.

 She’s not paying a lot of attention to her surroundings, instead focused on one watching the comings and goings of the people on the ground level. But Steph has always been able to maintain a residual level of alertness. She’s not worried about someone sneaking up on her, even as she focuses the majority of her attention on the scene below her.

Even if she had of been on full alert, it’s doubtful that she would have heard Batgirl land behind her.

In any case, she’s still caught off guard when Batgirl leans down beside her and places a hand on her shoulder.

Steph almost leaps out of her skin, which might have been slightly dangerous considering the height she’s at and her proximity to the edge of the rooftop, but Batgirl holds tight to her shoulder and she doesn’t move very far.

“Fuuuuck. One day you will have to stop doing that to me.” She says, heart racing uncomfortably in her chest.

Her voice is muffled by the mask as per usual when she responds, “One day you will hear me.”

Steph doubts that, but she also knows better than to disagree with Batgirl, so she changes the subject, “So what’s the sitch with the weapons dealio?”

Batgirl gave her the lowdown on the weapons deal, and their role in it. Batman and Nightwing would be busting in, busting up, Red Robin and Robin were on one of the other sides to prevent runners, and they were to incapacitate any runners on this side.

Red Hood was apparently on another mission, on the other side of the downtown district, so they should be able to stay non-lethal, and hopefully injury light.

Once Batgirl had finished briefing her on the job, she heard the recognisable static click of someone contacting her via her audio unit.

_“Spoiler, Oracle here. I’m going to patch you into the Bat Channel so you can communicate with them. Be on your best behaviour okay?”_

Steph is tempted to protest at the insinuation that she would be anything but, she did somewhat have a history of it.

But not around the Bat himself.

“Roger that Oracle.” She said instead, the audio gave a quick pop, and the Oracle’s voice was coming through her earpiece again.

“Okay team, Spoiler is online now, please keep the channel to mission essential communications only. Is everyone in position?”

_“Nightwing and B in position.”_

_“Robin in position.”_

_“Red Robin in position.”_

“Batigirl in position.”

“Spoiler in position.” Steph echoed the other responses into her own unit.

 A deep gravelly voice comes through the comms then.

_“We will wait until the boat with the shipment unloads and all parties are present before we move. I will give the go ahead, no one is to move until then.”_

Steph resists the urge to roll her eyes. Bats always feels the need to micromanage their operations. It’s probably why they go off so well as opposed to Steph’s managed disasters.

But still. The over management is why she’s fine being separate from the Bats for most things.

Steph taps her fingers against the wall while she waits. She wishes she could bring something to occupy her time. She gets bored on these sort of stakeouts. It’s why she normally stays on the move in her patrols. She’ll break up a mugging, then be on the way to the next criminal activity.

She does do the bigger crimes too, but she lives for the fight.

She wonders if the others feel the same. She knows Red Robin enjoys detecting, lives for the hunt. Nightwing loves to fly, it’s obvious to anyone.

Batman does this ‘for justice’.  She doesn’t know what Robin does it for. It’s obvious he’s young, and a little wild. Nightwing and Batman spend a lot of their time trying to rein him in. Red Robin doesn’t like working with him, although he won’t expand on why to Steph.

She suspects Red Hood is similar to her, that he does it for that action, but has a personal reason. She suspects Hood grew up on the streets, there’s something about him. Hood also does a lot of things just to piss off the Bats, something Steph finds amusing, not that she’d ever admit it to any of them.

She has no idea why Batgirl does it.

Trying not to make it obvious, she casts her eyes over Batgirl.

Batgirl is watching the ground below them, and unlike Steph, she seems completely unfazed by the lack of action. Steph isn’t sure she’s moved from her position since landing beside Steph what feels like _hours_ ago.

“How’d you come to be Batgirl?” Steph blurts out, before she can stop herself.

Batgirl doesn’t respond, doesn’t move. She doesn’t show any sign of having heard Steph, although she must have heard the words.

Steph figures thats a sign she should probably drop it.

But.

“You probably know this already. Red Robin probably told you. But I started this because my Dad was a villain. You might have heard of him. His name, his villain name anyway, is Cluemaster.” She sighs, “he’s a piece of trash.”

Batgirl doesn’t respond again, and Steph feels like maybe she should shut up, but she’s still bored, so bored, and Batgirl hasn’t actually told her to shut up.

So she continues on.

“So I umm, I started this to try and stop him. It’s where I got my name from ‘Spoiler’ I wanted to spoil his plans. Stop him from doing it, and stop him from hurting people. I was... kind of successful.”

Her voice cracks a little, and she swallows painfully around the lump that’s appeared in her throat.

“Then he tried to kill me.”

Her eyes prick at the memory of that night. She clenches her hands into fists, and her nervous energy before has disappeared on her. Gone is the energy, leaving only a sinking feeling behind in her stomach.

“He didn’t... he didn’t know I was his daughter then. But he would have killed me. Batman saved my life.” She squeezes her eyes tightly, blocking out the view of street she should be watching. Great, now she’s failing in her job here and now, just like she failed at all her attempts to stop her dad.

This time she doesn’t flinch when a hand closes on her shoulder. It’s not that she was expecting it this time, because she certainly wasn’t, but she’s just too absorbed in willing herself not to cry that she doesn’t have the energy left to expend on shock.

The hand is nice though, it’s not just on her shoulder, it’s rubbing over her shoulder, and occasionally squeezing her shoulder.

It’s nice. Steph feels like an idiot for losing it in front of Batgirl, not only does she probably not trust her now because of the villain father, now she thinks she’s a basket case.

She’s wondering if she could just call it quits. Maybe change her identity. Or move to a different city. Except her mum would never allow that. Not until she finished college at least.

“My parents were both bad people.” The hand stills for a second. “Assassins.”

“Oh,” Steph says, opening her eyes to look at Batgirl, but of course the mask hides any emotion Batgirl might be feeling, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to... I’m sorry for bringing this up.”

“No apologies.” Batgirls says. “It is what it is. We come from the same.”

“It’s not what we are.”  The hand moves from her shoulder down, before coming to a rest over her chest on her left side. “This is who we are.” The hand shifts again, moving to grasp Steph’s own hand, before pulling it to rest over Batgirl’s own left breast.

“We make our choices. To try to be good. To make things right. Like Meg.”

Steph’s brain shorts out a little, “Meg?” She asks, her brain is feels like it’s doing the maths. Two plus two is four, but she must have forgotten to carry a one somewhere because it’s adding up to Batgirl is Cass.

Her voice drops to a whisper “Meg... Meg Finn?” She asks again. She needs to be sure, so she continues on. “The Wish List?”

Batgirl gives a single nod, but it was unmistakeable.

“That was you.” Steph states.

“Yes.” Batgirl answers, even though it hasn’t been a question.

Before Steph can respond the comms crackle to life, _“Alright everyone they’re starting to unload be ready to move soon.”_

Batgirl drops the hold on Steph’s hand, and they move back to their positions watching over the street below.

Except now Steph can’t help the smile on her face, or her thoughts from racing.

Because she knows Batgirl. Batgirl came to her. Batgirl, _Cass_ came to her.

 

* * *

 

 

Sometimes they train together.

Steph knows she's nowhere near Cass’s level. She's under no illusions of that. But Cass is a good trainer. She's patient where Tim just wants to put her on her ass and show all the ways he's superior to her. Which isn't to say Cass doesn't put her on her ass. She does. But Cass will only put Steph on her ass a couple of times a lesson. Cass would then take Steph through what she did, and how to counter it, or point out Steph’s weaknesses which led to the ass kicking.

Cass certainly has the skills to put Steph on her ass every time.

When they’ve finished training Steph and Cass sit down and watch the other bats training, stretching, hydrating and observing. Sometimes Cass even gives her tips on the other bats.

“Red Robin gets distracted easily, overwhelm him and he’ll give you an opening.”

Steph snorts.

“Think I’ll need more than that to beat Tim.” Steph takes her right leg and stretches it out, folding her left leg so the sole of her foot is against her knee, then reaching for her right foot, feeling the stretch in her right hamstring. Her hamstrings are always tight, she runs and stretches, but she’ll never be able to kick high like Cass, or Dick, or Tim.

Cass looks up from where her head was honest to god _touching her knees_ to make eye contact with Steph. “You can beat Red Robin.”

“Hah. that’ll be the day” Steph switches to have her left leg outstretched, and her right leg folded, and starts the hamstring stretch on that side.

She’s focused on holding onto her foot, which is what she blames for the way she jumps when Cass places her hand on her shoulder.

“Shit Cass, give a girl some warning next time.” It’d be nice if just for once she could not be caught unawares by Cass.

Cass, as per usual, ignores her complaints, and put her hand back on Steph’s shoulder where it had rested briefly.

“You’re good. You underestimate yourself. They underestimate you too.”

She gives Steph a grin.

“Make them regret that.”

Her grin is infectious, and Steph finds herself smiling along with her. She still isn’t sure she could beat Tim, but Cass’s belief in her makes her feel invigorated. Like maybe it could be possible.

 

* * *

 

Red Hood once told her the only people that really listen in Gotham are the Gargoyles.

She isn’t sure that’s true, but she’s found herself sitting on top of one of the older buildings, with only a Gargoyle to keep her company.

She doesn’t want to be around any of the rest of the vigilante family right now, and she is not ready to go home.

When she hears the thump she assumes it’s Red Robin. She’s really not ready for another serving form him, so she ignores him, while contemplating her best method of escape.

She’s not above running.

She should probably swing her grapple around her buddy here and swing down. It should hold.

It better hold.

When Cass sits down beside her she can’t find it in her to be surprised, she’s just relieved it’s not Tim.

Steph had forgotten that she’d pulled her mask off, thrown somewhere on the roof. Her hood was pulled down as well.

“Shouldn’t.” Cass says, reaching over to take the hood in her hand and give it a little tug. Her voice is usually soft and stilted, but the mask obscures it even further. Steph had somewhat forgotten that she’d taken off her mask and hood. The Hood was simply pulled down, revealing her blonde hair, but the mask she’d viciously thrown into the roof, and not watched where it had bounced to before she’d turned away, coming to rest with her Gargoyle friend.

Steph snorts.

Story of her life.

Shouldn’t be Spoiler, shouldn’t be out here, shouldn’t be playing at vigilante, shouldn’t be sitting here on the roof with her mask and hood off.

Cass obviously means the mask and hood thing, but Steph still feels and the other shouldn’ts running around in her head.

Cass either gets inpatient with her, or realises that she has no intention of fixing her identity issue herself, because she reaches out again and pulls the hood up and over Steph’s head, covering up her blonde hair. Without pulling the face mask over too it wouldn’t do much to obscure her face if someone were to get up close, but it would help from afar.

Except Cass seems to have an answer for that too, maybe _has an answer for everything_ , because she reaches into one of her pouches and pulls out a domino mask and holds it out to Steph.

Steph snorts again, and makes no move to grab the offered mask.

Cass reaches the hand up to the side of her mask, hitting the release on the stitches on her mask, and the bottom half falls away to reveal her mouth.

“You identity is important.” She says, and pushes the mask into Steph’s hands.

Steph disagrees so much. Hers isn’t important in any way.

But she doesn’t feel like talking about that.

“So you want me to wear a mask under my mask?” Steph asks instead, doing her best to put all her apprehension into her voice.

Cass nods emphatically. “Hood does.”

“Yeah, well, Hood’s dramatic. And he has plenty to hide.” She studies the mask held in her hand, it’s a typical bat mask, just like she wore during her short stint as Robin. Her absolute failure of a stint as Robin. Just like her failure of a stint as Spoiler. Just like her failure of a life.

So much for not thinking about it.

Cass must read the souring of her mood. Because she quirks her head at Steph, before asking,  ”What’s wrong?”

Steph sighs.

“Everything. Me. Everything I do.” She fiddles with the mask in her hands, turning it over. The front may be black, but the inside of the mask is grey. “I ran into RR earlier tonight.” she admits.

“Little brother.” Cass acknowledges.

“He, umm, he said I had to give up Spoiler. That I was just, pretty much wasting everyone’s time.” The stinging in Steph’s eyes are not tears. She is not crying over something Tim said. Tim is a jerk.

Tim might still be right.

Which hurts more than his words.

Cass takes a seat next to her on the rooftop, hanging her legs over the side and kicking them out over side of the building.

Steph considers doing the same, but she’s satisfied with her position curled up into her Gargoyle friend.

“He’s wrong.” Cass says. Her voice is solid, and it leaves no room for argument, but Steph can’t help herself.

“You don’t know that.”

A hand grabs hers, and the fingers lace with her own. Before her hand is tugged into the space between them.

She squeezes her fingers almost reflexively, but otherwise doesn’t react.

Cass tugs her hand again, and Steph looks over to her.

“I do. I know. You’re good.”

Goddamnit. Steph had just started to get her emotions back in control, and now her eyes are threatening to betray her again, tears pricking at her eyes. She can’t look away from Cass though.

“You’re good.” Cass repeats. “You make a difference.”

Steph wants to cry. She wants to hug her.

She does both, letting go of her Gargoyle friend and capturing Cass in a hug with too much force, knocking them both back onto the rooftop.

“Thank you.” She chokes out into Cass’s neck, and Cass strokes her neck until her sobs calm and cease.

Even after her sobs have resided, they stay there, arms wrapped around each other.

Steph feel safe in Cass’s arms, and she’s in no rush to move.

 

* * *

 

It had been the last time that Steph and Cass has been hanging out in the park reading that Cass had asked her to the charity ball.

Steph had refused at first. She was not the sort of girl who attended charity balls. Nothing against them, or maybe a little bit against them. Because for all the charity balls Gotham’s elite held, it never seemed to trickle down to help any of the people on Gotham’s streets.

But maybe that was just her cynicism bleeding through.

So she refused.

Except Cass had asked again. Had asked again, and had said please.

Cass apparently needed to be there for a job, and she wanted backup, or maybe company. She hadn’t been the clearest.

So Steph had agreed. Even as she cursed herself for doing so.

Which left her with the current dilemma. Which cheapass dress should she wear to look completely out of place tonight amongst all of Gotham’s most stuck up elite.

And Cass.

“Uggghhh.” She groaned, throwing herself back onto her bed in frustration.

She should have bought a new dress. But she didn’t really have the money.  She wasn’t even sure why she was going tonight.

Except she did know why she was going. Because Cass had asked her.

She grabbed her pillow and groaned into it.

This was going to be a mess. A giant mess.

Just like her life.

Maybe if she takes on Scarecrow. If she gets a dose of fear toxin there is no way Cass can hold her to attending the Ball. She’s wondering if it’s worth contacting Oracle and ask for the latest on the big bads when a noise interrupts her thought train.

The sound of ‘call me beep me’ rings out, signalling a text on her phone.

She contemplates ignoring the message. She feels cursed, as if only bad is coming her way now. But then she considers that maybe the text is a call to action. Possibly something that will take up her whole night.

She’s not wrong exactly; it is a call to action, of sorts. The message is from an unknown number and reads: _ordered an uber for you, meet it out the front in 12 minutes._

Except Bats don’t use ubers.

Which is how she finds herself in the uber, driving towards central Gotham.

She doesn’t bother to ask where they’re going, but she does pay attention to where they are the whole time, watching the streets, and she’s ready to jump from the car the second it looks like this might be going awry. Wouldn’t be the first time she’s jumped from a moving car, and this one is much slower, having to deal with traffic limitations. But she is also wearing significantly less armour this time around so it’s probably for the best.

They pull over close to Gotham central, and when the door opens Timothy Drake Wayne hops in.

“No.”  She says, reaching for the handle, because she may be working with Red Robin when required, but she hasn’t forgiven him yet for the words he spewed at her. She certainly isn’t ready to hang out with him.

“Wait.” Tim says, and he reaches in her direction. Steph stares at the hand reaching for her, and is pleased to see the hand retract before it touches her.

“Just wait,” Tim repeats, “I know I was a tool, and I know that I’m probably the last person you want to see right now –“

“Got that right.” She mutters, and Tim definitely hears it.

“Look, it won’t make it better. And you still have every right to be angry at me I was... out of line.” He frowns at the words. “I fucked up. But I want to help you with this. If you want. Help you and Cass.”

Steph sighs, and leans her head against the car seat, looking at the roof of the SUV. She doesn’t really have much to lose at this stage.

“Fine.” She says, making sure she still sounds as annoyed as she feels. “But this doesn’t make it all better.”

“Of course.” Tim agrees.

“And you’re buying me a chilli dog.” Steph adds.

 

Which is how she finds herself wearing a dress more expensive by far than everything she owns, looking like she might actually belong at a Gotham Charity Ball.

She feels wrong. Like her skin is itching. Or maybe that’s the dress. The material is soft though, but she still feels like everything is rubbing her the wrong way. Her hair is pinned up and sprayed, her face is covered with makeup, like a mask.

Except she’d feel more comfortable wearing a mask than this.

She wishes there was a food table, then she could hide beside that, stuff her face full of food, and eliminate any suspicions that she fits in here.

Instead they have waiters walking around with their little plates of food. Steph nabs something from one of the plates as a waiter walks past and stuffs it in her face as the waiter turns to look at her. She gives her a smile with the food still in her mouth. She offers Steph a napkin from a fancy pile in her hand, but Steph shakes her head, waving her off.

When she finishes chewing she licks her fingers. There’s a middle aged woman watching her who looks appealed and Steph pokes her tongue at her, satisfied when the woman turns away from her.

She nabs a champagne flute from another waiter’s platter. Part of her wants to drain it, but she forces herself to sip it slowly. She’s still underage, and her mum is a medical professional, so alcohol is something of a rarity to her. She doesn’t need to get drunk and embarrass herself here.

She looks around at the crowd. The majority of the people here are older than her. She can see some Gotham celebrities who are younger, but for the most part they’re the older Gothamites.

It just makes her feel even more out of place. Against her better instincts, she downs the champagne and does an internal fuck you to anyone even considering judging her for it.

She’s searching the room for another waiter with the gift of champagne when she spots Cass.

Cass is walking through the door with Dick Grayson. Steph has always had an appreciation of the flying Grayson, you’d have to be blind not to, but next to Cass, Dick is barely even worth a second glance. Cass looks amazing in a black and gold dress, and Steph suddenly feels even more out of place. How can she be expected to stand next to Cass when she looks amazing and Steph probably looks like a _fraud_.

She needs to get out of here.

Tearing her eyes away from Cass, and hoping that Cass doesn’t notice her, she makes a break for one of the balconies. Only when she’s outside does she can feel like she can breathe again, the cold air on her skin helping to bring her back from the edge of panic.

She sucks in deep gasps of breath and leans against the balustrade.

She hears the sound of steps approaching her, and she wishes that just for once people would leave her behind.

When a hand falls on her bare shoulder she spins to give the offending person a serve, only to find the hand attached to Cass.

“Oh.” Steph says, stumped by her presence. She hadn’t expected Cass, the thing with Cass is you never expect her, you never hear her coming. “Hey, I didn’t think you’d seen me. You should have stayed inside with everyone. I just need a moment.”

“No.” Cass responds, “Here is good.”

“Here is terrible. It’s cold, and it’s away from everyone. Don’t you have a mission anyway?”

“No.” Cass says with a smile, “No mission tonight.”

“Then... Why am I here?” Steph asks, puzzled. “Why did you invite me?”

Cass’ arm slides down from her shoulder to her bicep, and gives a squeeze.

“I wanted you here.”

“Oh.”

“As a date?”

“Oh.” Steph says again. Date. This was a date.

Oka y then.

“Is that... okay?” Cass asked, and her eyes were searching Steph’s eyes, and her face looked worried.

“Yes!” Steph almost yells. She tries to tone herself down but her words jumble out in a rush. “Ohmygod yes that is so okay.”

“Okay.” Cass echoes, her face breaking out into a bright smile.

Steph feels her face break into a smile as well, and then she pulls Cass into a hug. Cass wraps her arms around her as well, and Steph dances them a little, rocking them from side to side in their embrace.

“But maybe... maybe we could stay out here for a bit, just you and me?”

“Yes.” Cass whispers into her neck, and the words ghost over her bare skin sending a shiver through her body.

Her voice is barely a whisper when she says “And maybe I could kiss you now?”

Cass pulls away, dropping her arms from the tight hug. Steph watches as her eyes drift to Steph’s lips and when she whispers “Yes.” Steph still hears her perfectly.

She leans forward into Cass’s space, hesitating at the last moment in case Cass has changed her mind, but when Cass doesn’t move she closes the space between them.

Their lips press together and Steph brings her right hand up to hold onto Cass’s neck, and Cass’s hand comes up to hold onto her arm, her other hand resting on Steph’s hip. It’s gentler than Steph usually is, their lips tentatively pressed together, and Steph tentatively flicks out her tongue against Cass’s. She’s rewarded with Cass’s lips falling open and she licks in, meeting Cass’s tongue with her own.

When they break away Steph is breathing faster than she was before the kiss.

“That was...” She struggles to find the words. “Good, Great? I... I would like to do that again.”

“Okay.” Cass says with a smile.

“Okay.” Steph agrees, before leaning back in to kiss her again.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!  
> I hope you enjoyed.  
> Find me on tumblr if you want at candybarrnerd


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